


When You Leave Your Heart Behind

by prettyboyangel



Category: Supernatural
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-25
Updated: 2013-01-25
Packaged: 2017-11-26 20:03:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/653916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prettyboyangel/pseuds/prettyboyangel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Dean gets out of Purgatory, he starts experiencing emotions that might not be his own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When You Leave Your Heart Behind

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little something I wrote while waiting for season gr8 to start.

It was three days before Dean realized something might be wrong.

Per Sam’s request, they were easing back into hunting very slowly. The first couple of days after Dean got out of purgatory the two spent most of their time driving around seeing local sights (but avoiding like the plague anything resembling a mystery spot). Dean had missed the feel of the Impala, her low growl, the sight of the asphalt speeding by, road stretching out for miles. So they drove. Crashing in cheap motel rooms like they always had, eating whatever local diner food the town of the day had to offer. It was peaceful.

Yet despite this peace, every now and then Dean would notice a nagging tendril of fear and anxiety worming in the pit of his stomach. The sun shining bright and warm around them, summer air billowing through the car from the open windows, not a hunt in sight, yet the sensation refused to leave him alone.

It was three more days before Dean was forced to acknowledge something was wrong. 

Driving down an empty stretch of highway somewhere in Illinois, out of nowhere fear slammed Dean, leaving him just enough control over his senses to pull the car onto the side of the road and fall out of the driver’s side door, panting and shaking. Sam rushed to his side, grasping his arm.

“Dean! Dean! Oh my god Dean what’s wrong? What happened?”

Dean gasped huge lungfuls of air, trying his best to slow his heart rate and regain control of his body. The panic rolled over him in waves, anxiety squeezing his heart as it hammered in his chest. It was a feeling he hadn’t felt in a long time; the terror of being hunted.

His whole body shook as Sam grasped his shoulders, at a loss for what to do but trying to be calm him down nonetheless.

“Hey, Dean, c’mon, tell me what’s wrong,” Sam murmured, the crack in his voice betraying how freaked out he was. Dean took a few more deep breaths, focusing on a crack in the pavement beneath his knee, the sun warm on the back of his neck, and his brother’s hands grounding him. No one was chasing him. He was safe.

When the panic had subsided a few moments later to simply a twisting in his gut, he met Sam’s panicked eyes and forced out a small smile. 

“I’m alright, Sammy,” he breathed, “just gotta get my sea legs back.”

And with that, he picked them both up and got back in the car, praying this was a one time deal.

It wasn’t.

Two days later, Dean woke to Sam shaking him, a piercing scream of terror filling his ears. It took him a moment to realize it was coming from his mouth. It wasn’t just fear that had control of him, causing his limbs to twist in the sheets and tears to spill from his eyes. Hopelessness and despair hollowed the pit of his stomach as pain ripped across his shoulder blades, right where his wings should manifest.

Wait; wings?

Understanding hit him full force but did nothing to ease the panic. These weren’t his emotions. After a year of protecting each other, spending every waking and sleeping moment together, connecting with each other in a way neither of them ever had before, Dean didn’t understand why it had taken him so long to grasp what was happening here. 

“Cas,” he gasped, grabbing Sam’s forearms so hard they might bruise, desperate to get his brother to understand, “we have to get him out Sammy we have to.”

“Dean, what are you talking about?” Sam grabbed him back as Dean took several more gasping breaths, “you’re freaking me out man what’s going on?”

As Dean’s heart rate stuttered back to normal, the twist of fear still tying his stomach in knots, he tried to explain.

“I can…I think I can feel him, man,” he stammered, scrubbing a hand over his face, “when he feels something really strong, like the other day in the car, it was like being hunted. And right now I think…I think he thinks we abandoned him.” Dean finally met his brother’s gaze and Sam was struck by the hopelessness in his eyes. He looked heartbroken. 

“Dean,” Sam sat on the edge of the bed, turning his body to face his brother, “Dean I thought you said he died.”

Dean shook his head. “He…he didn’t die,” he said slowly, as if choosing his words very carefully, “You can’t die in purgatory, not really. He just…let go. He wouldn’t come with us. He-” Dean’s voice broke under the weight of emotion, “he said he had to stay behind, had to pay for his sins. He made me swear not to try to break him out.” Dean’s voice wavered, tears collecting in the corners of his eyes. For the first time, Sam was hit with how close his brother and the angel had been; the loss of him was wearing Dean down like a physical burden. 

Sam ran his hands through his hair and clapped them down on his knees. 

“Well we gotta find a way to get him back.” He stated, as if nothing had ever been more obvious. Dean looked up at him.

“Dude, I swore I wouldn’t.” He breathed, practically begging to be contradicted, “he - I swore.”

Sam watched a small spark of hope begin to flicker behind his brother’s eyes. Even if he hadn’t desperately wanted to get Cas back himself, that would have been enough to convince him.

“I think Cas has done enough penance,” he said, “if what you’re feeling are his extreme emotions…dude they had you flat out twice now. And you’re not running for your life. He is. We’ve gotta get him out.” Sam tried to ignore the flush of joy that washed over his stomach at the hope that transformed his brother’s features. 

“Do you think it’s even possible?” Dean murmured, desperate for reassurance.

Sam swallowed around the lump in his throat. “Yeah,” he nodded, “yeah man, I really think it is.” He patted Dean’s leg through the blanket and went back to his own bed, pulling the covers over him before saying to the ceiling, “but we can’t do anything till morning, so go back to sleep.”

Dean readjusted himself in his blankets and fell back against the pillow as an idea overtook him. If he could feel Cas…

He took a deep breath and focused on the hope flooding his gut, overriding the panic and soothing his trembling. We’re coming to get you, Cas, he thought with all his strength, don’t you give up on me now you stubborn son of a bitch. 

And as he drifted off again, he felt the panic lessen its hold on him just enough. 

It was another month before they got Cas out, all the while Dean doing his best to send back waves of encouragement and peace and (dare he admit it?) love whenever the fear and hopelessness got strong. Pulling him out wasn’t easy, but in the end they made a deal with some witch in exchange for letting her go free. As Cas stood in front of them in their dingy motel room, dirty and exhausted, with most of the light gone out of his eyes, Dean and Sam both held their breath, waiting. But when Cas looked up into Dean’s eyes from across the room, the wave of love and comfort and relief that came crashing down on him almost drowned him. And it was the fact that Dean couldn’t tell which of them it was coming from that sent him across the room, pulling Cas to him and clutching the back of his tattered trench coat in shaking fists.


End file.
